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Mandios, above the village of Jayuya, considerably more distant, 

 our return to Utuado from that point being only affected at eleven 

 o'clock at night, but the sure-footed little horses brought us all 

 in safely through the wonderful tropical night, richly ladened 

 with the plants of the wet primaeval forest. 



The primeval mountain forests of Porto Rico are now restricted 

 to a few summits in this west-central part of the island and to the 

 forest reserve of over one hundred square miles in the high Sierra 

 de Luquillo in the eastern part, established by a proclamation of 

 President Roosevelt in 1904; they are dense jungles composed 

 of very many different kinds of trees and shrubs, the mountain 

 palm {Acrista monticola) being the most prominent features in those 

 visited by us ; climbing ariods {Philodendron) reached to their 

 summits; graceful tree ferns add enchantment to the vistas; 

 small ferns, mosses and lichens in great variety carpet the ground 



